Excerpt from Book 1 Chapter 8: A Knight's Tale
by Penny Freeman
(In the wake of his father's untimely death, Durant slips into Sandy's sickroom in the dead of night where she battles life-threatening pneumonia.)
As Piper watched Sandy, contemplating exactly what he should do, she tugged at the collar of her nightgown and fretted at the bedclothes despite her drug-induced torpidity. He thought to cool her fevered brow, but, before he ventured to her bedside, he moved the lamp to the far side of the room and lowered its flame until it almost guttered. With only the light of the low fire at his back, his face would be completely veiled in shadow, as dark as the far side of the moon.
“Hush, precious” he breathed as he replaced the cool compress upon her head. “Rest now. Be still.”
To his dismay, Sandy struggled against the physic and managed to pry open first one eye and then the other, although her lids were heavy indeed. “Dragon?” she peeped. She reached up to touch his face, and he could not bring himself to deny her. “My dragon, is it you?”
Piper forced his voice as deep into his chest as he could manage. “No darling. This is only a dream.” She fell into a fit of coughing, then curled into a ball in an attempt to relieve the pain. Tears seeped from her closed eyes. “It hurts,” was the extent of her complaint.
